Cloudy, with a Chance of Crime
by Elflocks
Summary: Batman doesn't really have bad days, but if Cat Woman gets involved, I guess you could say that might be one of them. Or not...?  Not specifically based on any one movie/cartoon.


Well, **Poestheblackcat**, think of this as part of your belated birthday present. It's either finished or not finished, depending on you. I have _no_ idea where I'm goin' with it. I just started writing it spur of the moment after watching _Batman_ (1989). ^^; Hope you enjoy.

Also, thanks for reading it over first, **Truemythewise**. It encouraged me to post it sooner & caught that thing about DID. :D

No warnings, except maybe for cheesiness. It's been awhile since I watched all the Batman movies, and as a kid, I was into the cartoon. Also, please forgive me for the title. Please.

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><p><strong>"Cloudy, With a Chance of Crime"<br>**

Because the skies of Gotham are always cloudy, the signal is clearly visible in the sky.

Some might call it frightening, others, ridiculous-the silhouette of a giant bat. To Bruce Wayne, it meant he was needed, that he had a duty and responsibility toward the City. It was also the moment his adrenaline revved up, and he shifted into a gear that average human beings rarely attained. It was easy to compartmentalize-a kid who'd lost his parents at such a young age, and saw them die right in front of him. It was even easier, using all that rage to fight the types of people who'd put it there in the first place.

He'd had people tell him he was like those people, borderline- something, psychotic, or just plain nutso, at the very least. Or maybe dissociative identity disorder, a compulsive, dark identity apart from his own. Yeah, he could buy that.

A funny thing he'd noticed: when he was around, criminals seemed to sense him and started telling ghost stories about "the Bat." Maybe it was a primal instinct of some sort, the kind that warned of unseen danger. And Bruce didn't lie to himself. Batman was dangerous, like a wild animal that, if set loose, would wreak havoc, but if tamed, could generate that pure wildness into useful, productive energy. That was why he didn't stop, even though he knew where this path was going to lead him someday. It was better to fight in darkness than to become a part of it, lost for lack of purpose.

Bats listened, in a sense. It was how they moved around-echolocation. In the deepest, darkest cave, where humans could only imagine sight, a bat _could_ see.

Now Bruce listened. He heard one of the gunmen say, "... seems to show up just at the right moment, man. I don't know. Some guys I talked to, they say they heard he's a monster."

"Come on, get real," his buddy answered, and hoisted a box into the back of a truck.

"No, seriously. It's like he's psychic or something, like he senses evil."

"Evil, huh?" The man started checking his bullets, back to the truck. "I'm just in this for the money. It's not like we're all sadistic monsters that get a kick out of murder and mayhem, like that Joker freak. I'm just trying to earn a living here, pay the bills, keep the woman happy."

"Yeah? Isn't that how we all start out? Then we get cocky, or a screw gets knocked loose."

"Sheesh, much of a downer today, Bob?"

"Whatever, Duke."

"Hey, you were the one getting all existential on me, pal." They started back to work, or their version of it, and Bruce had a moment of hesitancy. He could always go easy on them...

Slipping up from behind wasn't hard when someone had wires and state of the art glider wings. He knocked Duke out, and tied up Bob by the ankles to a moving crane.

"Who do you work for?" How many times had he asked this question? Someone might think he would have been tired of this game by now. But his heart still pumped the exact same way, and the flash of fear in his prey's eyes made his lips twitch still with the same grim smile. A person might think _he_ was a little sadistic. But if he was a predator, than this was his way of being merciful.

After some stammering and crying, and sweating, Bob told him the name of his employer, and who might know a little more.

He knocked out Bob too before he went on his way.

In the car, it didn't take long to reach the right place. However, on reaching the business tower, he realized the person entering probably shouldn't be Batman. Actually, perhaps finding out about this mastermind would be more Bruce's territory.

He could, however, do a little reconnaissance, do what he did best, watch and listen.

It only took moments for his movement and sound sensors to pick up an area of activity. He scaled the building with his grapple hook, and stood on the ledge outside the room of interest. He looked in, and caught a glimpse of a woman in a skin-tight, black leather suit. As he moved back out of the way, to avoid being sighted by the henchmen to whom she was speaking, he remembered that mask of the suit had cat ears, or some other type of ears, and she'd been flicking a bull whip almost playfully between her two henchmen, who shifted to the sides to get away from it.

_Cat Woman._ The thief who'd recently been sighted at the scene of many jewelry heists.

If _she_ was behind this, Batman definitely had a problem. Not only was she intelligent, she was impulsive and fickle, and just a little maliciously mischievous.

The best way, and he'd already been leaning toward this, was to come to her as Bruce Wayne. Did she work in the building? She probably did. Thieves were often proficient con artists as well. She would have needed an in to the huge conglomerate. That was how he would have done it, anyway.

"Why, hello there."

She was leaning out of the window, no, not just leaning, practically dangling. The whip hooked at her hip, and a metal-clawed hand grasping the window frame.

He jumped a little, but by the time he'd thought about flying away, she was already tracing her hand across the leather armor of his pectorals. "Spying on me?"

"I might ask why you're so concerned about being watched."

Her green, slit-pupil eyes traced up and down his form, rested on his jaw line, then finally met his eyes again. "Someone else might ask why you're outside on the ledge of a twenty-story building." Her red lips curved into a feline smile.

Just as he was reaching for his grapple gun, she lashed out with a lightening-quick swipe of her claws.

Knocked off balance, he barely had time to use the gun before he fell. It missed its purchase, and his heart hammered in his head, and his mind sifted through his options as he fell through rushing, chilled air.

Then a body knocked into him, causing him to veer off course from his inevitable death. They hit the top of a building, rolled. Bruce groaned and rolled to his side just in time to see Cat Woman easily flipping back onto her feet. "That was exhilarating," she said, almost a purr in her tone.

He did _not_ want to be doing this right now. This cat and mouse game. Not with her, not tonight. He threw a smoke bomb and leaped off the side of the building, extended his arms so that the glider function in the suit's cape could snap into place.

He could hear her laugh echoing above him, a sultry, throaty murmur, mocking and yet somehow inviting.

_At least I'll have something to go by. I'd recognize that voice anywhere._

That presented a problem. He'd spoken enough that there was a chance she'd recognize him too.

_I think I just met my match._ Or trouble.


End file.
